FilmScene to screen Oscar-nominated shorts, appease A.D.D. generation

Sure, movies are great and everything, but do they all gotta be so gosh dang long? Short films are awesome. If you hate a short, it’s no big deal, you only have to wait, like, ten minutes until it’s over.

It’s a good thing, then, that Film Scene is screening all of the Oscar nominated short films from Friday, January 31 to February 13. Divided into three programs — animation, live action, and documentary — there’s something for everyone who loves movies, but also have short attention spans. The whole thing kicks off on Friday at 6:30 p.m. with the live action program, clocking in at 113 minutes.

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But since we’re all a bunch of “wacky characters” (cough), let’s instead take a closer look at the animated program (premiering Friday at 9 p.m.) for some of the lighter, PG-rated offerings.

Get a Horse!

If you’ve caught Frozen, the latest Disney feature length, you saw this one already. Directed by Lauren MacMullan, Get a Horse! harkens back to the early days of Mickey Mouse, in all his black-and-white glory — and throws it into a modern technicolor dream world. Coolest detail? They used archived recordings of Walt Disney’s original Mickey voice from the ’20s and ’30s to make up the dialogue. Or maybe they thawed him out of his cryogenic slumber?

Mr. Hublot

Mr. Hublot answers the age-old question: what would happen if Wallace and Gromit got really into steam-punk? It’s the story of an eccentric, isolated man whose carefully ordered life is thrown into disarray when he comes across a robotic dog. There are some pretty nice references to Mr. Hulot for the Francophiles in the audience, too.

Feral

Feral is the starkest selection in the bunch. Directed by Daniel Sousa and Dan Golden, the plot is based on the “child raised by wolves” trope, as a hunter finds a boy in the woods and returns him to civilization. But it’s the stylized minimalism, dream-like and intense, that makes this short worth your time.

Possessions

Possessions is the only anime selection this year. Directed by Shuhei Morita, it tells the story of a man who stumbles upon a dilapidated shrine while seeking shelter from a storm and finds a number of household objects — all of which are possessed by spirits. It’s atmospheric, and definitely carries the torch of classic anime movies like My Neighbor Totoro, although it goes to somewhat darker places.

Room on the Broom

Sure, it doesn’t have the resurrected voice of Walt Disney, but Room on the Broom holds it’s own when it comes to star power. Simon Pegg, Gillian Anderson, Sally Hawkins, and Rob Brydon all appear in this short tale about a friendly witch who gathers her friends (a cat! a dog! a bird! a frog!) for an adventure.

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